d to escape."

Several other stags were startled, but these all escaped, the dogs
being too fatigued with their first run to be able to keep up with
them. The other dogs were therefore unloosed and allowed to range
about the country. They started several hyenas, some of which they
themselves killed; others they brought to bay until the lads ran up
and dispatched them with their arrows, while others which took to
flight in sufficient time got safely away, for the hyena, unless
overtaken just at the start, can run long and swiftly and tire out
heavy dogs such as those the party had with them.

After walking some fifteen miles the lads stopped suddenly on the brow
of a sandhill. In front of them was a wide expanse of water bordered
by a band of vegetation. Long rushes and aquatic plants formed a band
by the water's edge, while here and there huts with patches of
cultivated ground dotted the country.

"We are at the end of our journey," Rabah said. "These huts are
chiefly inhabited by fowlers and fishermen. We will encamp at the foot
of this mound. It is better for us not to go too near the margin of
the water, for the air is not salubrious to those unaccustomed to it.
The best hunting ground lies a few miles to our left, for there, when
the river is high, floods come down through a valley which is at all
times wet and marshy. There we may expect to find game of all kinds in
abundance."

CHAPTER VI.

FOWLING AND FISHING.

The tents, which were made of light cloth intended to keep off the
night dews rather than to afford warmth, were soon pitched, fires were
lighted with fuel that had been brought with them in order to save
time in searching for it, and Rabah went off to search for fish and
fowl. He returned in half an hour with a peasant carrying four ducks
and several fine fish.

"We shall do now," he said; "with these and the stag our larder is
complete. Everything but meat we have brought with us."

Chebron, although he had kept on bravely, was fatigued with his walk
and was glad to throw himself down on the sand and enjoy the prospect,
which to him was a new one, for he had never before seen so wide an
expanse of water.

When on the top of the hill he had made out a faint dark line in the
distance, and this Rabah told him was the bank of sand that separated
the lake from the Great Sea. Now from his present position this was
invisible, and nothing but a wide expanse of water stretching away
until it